Brando lunged forward, grabbing Giorgio's arm just as the ground crumbled beneath him. With a jerk, he pulled him back, both of them rolling in the snow as the hole widened where Giorgio had been a second before.

  "Shit," Mira whispered, approaching the edge. "Look."

  Below them opened a perfectly circular tunnel with walls polished like glass. It disappeared into darkness in both directions.

  "Impossible," Marco said. "The maps don't show any tunnels in this area."

  Rusty approached the opening, sniffing the air. His third eye pulsed with increasingly intense light.

  "It must be natural," Marco continued, but his voice trembled slightly. "The ice melts and reforms, creates cavities..."

  "No," Brando interrupted. "Look at the walls."

  The ice forming the walls wasn't natural. When Brando touched it again, it yielded under the pressure of his fingers like a semi-solid gelatin, while maintaining its shape.

  "The ice isn't melting; it's being altered," Mira said, studying the anomalous surface.

  "And if there are tunnels like this everywhere..." Brando began.

  "It means we're not the only ones moving out here," Marco finished with a tense voice.

  Mira took out the communicator. "We should warn the West Team."

  Fssshhhhhhh...

  When she pressed the button, only an annoying interference noise came from the device.

  "The weather's getting worse," Giorgio said, still pale from the fright. "Maybe it's interfering with the signal."

  "Or maybe there's something else interfering," Brando murmured.

  Marco turned abruptly. "What do you mean?"

  Before Brando could answer, a deep sound vibrated through the ice. Like the breath of something enormous. Rusty growled loudly.

  "We need to move," Marco said nervously. "The second sensor should be two hundred meters in that direction."

  They moved slowly now, careful where they stepped. Snow fell thickly, making it difficult to see beyond a few meters.

  The second sensor was like the first: buried in snow with a blinking red light. But this time the ice around it was even worse, almost liquid. A bad omen.

  Mira's communicator suddenly made a sound. Through the signal disturbance, they clearly heard a voice.

  "...below..."

  "It's not working anymore, forget it," Marco cut in.

  A few minutes later, they reached the third sensor and stopped abruptly. It hadn't been replaced or damaged; it had been ripped from its base, as if something had grabbed it and pulled with immense force.

  "The cold couldn't have done this," Mira said, observing the deformed metal.

  Marco checked the map on his KryoWatch. "There's another group of sensors to the east. Let's change course."

  "No." Brando's voice was firm. "Look."

  He pointed to a series of marks in the snow. They looked like footprints, but they were too large, too deep. And above all, they were fresh.

  "To the east, the tracks are more concentrated," he continued. "Whatever it is, it's moving in that direction."

  "You don't decide the route, Zeta." Marco clenched his fists. "I'm in command, and I say we go east."

  "Oh, sure." Brando stepped forward. "Like when you almost got Giorgio killed by ignoring the signs of unstable ice?"

  "Marco," Mira intervened, defusing the budding argument between the two. "Look at this, there's something here."

  She had knelt beside one of the footprints. In the snow was a liquid with the same gelatinous consistency as before, but more pronounced.

  "The protocol says—" Marco began, but was interrupted by a dull roar, like something huge moving under the ice.

  "West," Brando said. "At least the ground seems more solid there."

  Giorgio, who had remained silent until that moment, took a step toward Marco. "Maybe we should listen to him."

  "You..." Marco turned to him, incredulous. "You trust a Zeta more than me?"

  "I trust whoever just saved my life."

  "Fine," Marco growled. "We'll go west. But when we find out it was a waste of time..."

  He broke off. Through the storm, a figure loomed in the distance.

  "It's the West Team," Mira said, squinting her eyes. "That must be Bianca."

  Rusty suddenly barked. The ice beneath their feet emitted a long, sinister creak.

  "They're moving toward a dangerous area," Brando said, noticing how Bianca's figure approached an area where the snow was soaked with that strange gelatinous liquid.

  "How do you—" Marco began, but Brando was already running.

  Behind him, he heard the others calling. But the sound of their voices was swallowed by the wind and the beating of his heart that echoed in his ears. Something was about to happen. He felt it in his Cold Veins, saw it in Rusty's behavior, sensed it in the way the ice vibrated beneath his feet.

  And Bianca was walking straight into danger.

  "BIANCA!" Brando's shout was swallowed by the wind.

  The distance between the two teams rapidly decreased. Through the swirling snow, Brando could better distinguish the figures: Bianca walking, Ripa following her, Giordano and Antonio further back.

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  Crack.

  The sound came from beneath his feet. The cracks suddenly widened. Brando's heart hammered in his chest; one false step and he would plunge into the abyss.

  "BRANDO!" Giordano's voice cut through the storm. "DON'T MOVE!"

  It was at that moment that Brando understood: the West Team wasn't walking toward them. They were running away. The ice beneath their feet wasn't solid. It was like a thin crust above what seemed like a tunnel or a cave.

  "BACK!" Brando shouted to his companions. "THE ICE—"

  A new deep sound interrupted him. It wasn't the ice breaking. It was like the awakening of something enormous.

  He saw Bianca stop. For the first time, he saw something new on her face: fear.

  The ground trembled. The ice beneath Bianca melted like wax, collapsing upon itself. Ripa and Giordano lunged to grab her. Too late. The ice swallowed all three of them.

  "NO!" Brando darted forward.

  The ice beneath his feet finally broke. The last thing he thought, as he plunged into darkness, was that they had found something much worse than a simple tunnel.

  The impact was brutal. Brando hit the ice with a force that made him see stars. The darkness was total, so dense it seemed solid. He felt Rusty's body land beside him with a dull thud.

  "Shit," Giordano's voice came from somewhere to his right. "Is anyone dead?"

  "Not yet," Ripa replied. His tone was tense, but devoid of his usual arrogance.

  A click echoed in the darkness. Bianca's KryoWatch lit up, casting a small light on the scene. The others quickly imitated her.

  Brando looked around, and his stomach knotted. They hadn't fallen into a simple cave. The walls around them pulsed weakly, covered by an organic substance that seemed alive.

  "It's a Pit," Bianca said.

  "Impossible," Ripa rose slowly, holding his arm. "There shouldn't be Pits this close to the Polis."

  "Evidently you're wrong," Bianca pointed to the walls. "This is definitely a Glacial Pit."

  Brando's KryoWatch emitted a sharp beep. A red warning appeared on the display:

  [DANGER - Glacial biological traces detected]

  [Estimated Grade: 1-2]

  [Distance: ???]

  "The weaker Glacials," Bianca explained while studying the pulsing walls, "create these places to survive. They hide here until they become strong enough to emerge."

  Rusty trembled violently beside Brando. His third eye glowed with a feverish light, and the fur on his back had risen like needles of ice.

  "We need to get out of here," Giordano said, shaking off the dust accumulated during the fall. "Like, now."

  VROOM.

  A sound echoed in the tunnels below them. A sound that had nothing natural about it, like a child's cry mixed with a beast's growl.

  "Communications don't work," Brando said, checking his KryoWatch. "We're too deep."

  "How deep?" Giordano asked.

  Bianca moved away from the others, exploring the perimeter of the ice platform where they had landed.

  "We're about thirty meters below the Academy," she said dryly, studying the data on her device. "But I can't see where we fell from. The light is... absorbed somehow."

  "Then why can't we communicate?" Giordano asked, waving his KryoWatch. "Thirty meters shouldn't block the signal."

  "Because depth isn't the problem," Bianca replied. "It's the nature of this place. Glacial Pits have intrinsic protections that distort space and block any form of communication. We're completely isolated."

  Another sound resonated through the tunnels, closer this time. Rusty emitted a metallic growl and pressed against Brando's leg.

  "The main tunnel seems to lead downward," Ripa said, illuminating a passage that descended into darkness. "If we want to find an exit, we'll have to go deeper."

  "Are you insane?" Giordano turned to him. "Did you hear those sounds? Down there there are—"

  "Glacials," Bianca interrupted. "And if we stay here, they'll find us anyway."

  Brando's KryoWatch emitted another beep.

  [DANGER - Movement detected]

  [Distance: 50m and approaching]

  "Decide quickly," he said, as Rusty began to growl toward the darkness. "Because something's coming to welcome us."

  The first warning was the silence. A silence so dense that Brando could hear his heartbeat echoing in his ears.

  The KryoWatch vibrated on his wrist.

  [DANGER - Grade 1 Glacial]

  [Distance: 30m]

  [Warning: Aggressive behavior]

  "Turn on the KryoWatch torches," Ripa whispered. "All of them."

  Four beams of light cut through the darkness. Rusty emitted a metallic sound, his third eye pulsing frantically.

  That's when they saw it.

  The Glacial emerged from the shadow like a nightmare made flesh. Five deformed boar heads rose from a humanoid body that appeared to have been flayed alive. Fifteen blood-red eyes stared at them with primitive hunger. From its navel extended a protuberance that ended in a bony harpoon.

  "Christ," Giordano whispered.

  The smell hit them immediately after: rotting flesh and something chemical that burned the nostrils.

  The creature moved. The harpoon shot toward Bianca with supersonic speed. She dodged it with unnatural grace, but the missed blow exploded the ice behind her.

  "Spread out!" Ripa shouted, materializing ice fists on his hands. "Don't give it an easy target!"

  Brando created a violet ice spike. It looked like a toy compared to the monstrosity they faced.

  The Glacial attacked again. The harpoon lunged toward Giordano, who managed to block the blow with an ice barrier, but it crumbled on impact.

  Ripa launched forward with a roar. His ice-covered fists struck one of the monster's heads. The impact was like thunder in a cave. The head exploded in a fountain of black blood.

  But the other four heads reacted immediately. The monster charged him, and one of the four heads lunged in a gore attack against Ripa and threw him against the wall.

  "RIPA!" Giordano tried to reach him, but the Glacial's harpoon forced him to take cover behind a column.

  Brando moved on instinct. He threw his spike aiming for the eyes of the nearest head. The ice penetrated the orbit with a nauseating sound. The Glacial screamed a sound that mixed the agony of a man with the cry of a beast.

  "The eyes!" Brando shouted. "Aim for the eyes!"

  Rusty barked a warning. A tentacle darted toward Brando. He threw himself sideways, but not fast enough, and the harpoon tore his side. Pain exploded like burning fire. Brando rolled on the icy stone, blood staining his uniform.

  The creature focused on him. All the heads turned, eleven red eyes glowing with hunger. The harpoon rose for the final blow.

  "NO!" Giordano materialized a barrage of ice projectiles. They hit the Glacial but bounced off its skin as if it were steel.

  Ripa stood up, blood flowing from a wound on his head. He tried to charge again, but with a swipe of its hand, the creature hit him in the chest, sending him to the ground.

  The Glacial was too strong. Their ice couldn't penetrate its natural armor. The eyes were vulnerable, but they were too fast to hit.

  That's when Bianca moved.

  She stepped forward calmly, as if taking a stroll. The Glacial turned toward her, all heads growling in unison.

  "Stay back," she said. Her voice was as cold as the abyss.

  She raised a hand. The air around her seemed to crystallize.

  The ice that formed wasn't like what they had seen before. It wasn't the violet of the three of them. It was a bright yellow, almost golden, and pulsed with pure energy.

  Brando's KryoWatch went crazy.

  [WARNING - Yellow Stage detected]

  [Power: Beyond measurement parameters]

  [Warning: Critical energy level]

  "Impossible," Ripa whispered, eyes wide. "That's..."

  The yellow ice condensed around Bianca's hand, forming a blade as thin as a razor. With a fluid movement, she hurled it at the Glacial.

  The blade cut through the air with a hiss. The Glacial tried to block it somehow, but the yellow ice passed through it as if it were pudding.

  The blow severed all the heads in a single, clean movement. The monster's body remained standing for an instant, then collapsed in a pool of its own black blood.

  Silence returned to the cave.

  "Yellow Stage," Giordano said, his voice trembling. "Fuck, she's at Yellow Stage."

  Brando slowly stood up, holding his wounded side. His brain tried to process what he had just seen.

  A Yellow Stage. More powerful than Esposito's Green. A level that required years of training to reach. And Bianca had just used it as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

  "How?" Ripa asked, his voice betraying confusion for the first time. "How is it possible? You just entered the Academy..."

  "No," Brando said, the puzzle pieces beginning to fit together. "She didn't just enter. Her training began much earlier. Years earlier."

  Bianca turned toward them. Her green eyes gleamed in the half-light with an unnatural light.

  "We have more urgent problems," she said, ignoring their questions. "That fight will have attracted attention. And there are worse things than a grade one Glacial in this Pit."

  As if to give weight to her words, a distant roar made the cavern walls tremble. A sound that made the cries of the monster they had just killed seem like a newborn's wail.

  Rusty pressed against Brando's leg, trembling. His third eye was fixed on the tunnel that descended deeper.

  "Who are you really?" Brando asked.

  Bianca didn't answer. She merely materialized a small sphere of yellow ice that illuminated the tunnel before them.